Home / Poker News December 2012 / PokerStars Looking to Re-enter US Market
PokerStars Looking to Re-enter US Market
Posted by: Randy Williams - Sun, 2012-12-09 12:00
PokerStars’ lawyers have always served the operation well, giving the management healthy legal advice among all the pitfalls of an extremely hazy legal environment surrounding the game on a global level. The site has been locked out of the US market since Black Friday, but it has since proved itself reliable and trustworthy in more ways than one. Not only did
PokerStars manage to pay back its US players, they essentially bailed out their long-time rival Full Tilt Poker too, by taking it over and repaying their non-US customers as well. It now looks like PokerStars’ legal counsels may have found a way for the online poker operation to stage a return to the US market.
The site may end up purchasing the Atlantic Club casino in Atlantic City, thus establishing a foothold in the brick and mortar world of US-based gambling and poker. The Atlantic Club is currently struggling, but a new piece of legislation which the New Jersey Assembly has just approved a few days ago, may provide it with the breath of fresh air it needs.
The said bill, pushed by State Sen. Ray Lesniak, has been approved in an amended form. Initially, there had been a provision in it referring to “bad actors”, operators that continued to serve US customers after the 2006 UIGEA, which would’ve essentially barred PokerStars from entering the market. In its amended form though, the bill would in fact allow PokerStars to purchase a land-based operation.
In the settlement it has reached with the US DoJ, which allowed it to take over Full Tilt Poker, PokerStars has not admitted to any wrong-doing, so theoretically, its acquisition of the Atlantic Club only hinges on Ray Lesniak’s newest online gambling/poker bill.
According to Lesniak, PokerStars entry to the New Jersey market is something desirable for the State.
